Brian Harris

Brian Harris

Tuesday 8 April 2008 19.35 EDT
First published on Tuesday 8 April 2008 19.35 EDT

The defining image of the footballer Brian Harris, who has died aged 72, came late in the 1966 FA Cup Final between Everton and Sheffield Wednesday. Everton had just scored an improbable equaliser, having earlier been two goals down, and for one exuberant supporter the emotion became too much.

Embarking on a mazy run across the Wembley turf, the fan evaded one policeman, who groped forlornly at his empty jacket, before being rugby tackled by a second, who lost his helmet in the process. As the supporter tried to free himself to embrace Everton's captain, Brian Labone, a beaming Harris could be seen in the background, trying on the helmet for size.

The interlude was a public exposition of Harris's wicked sense of humour, which even in moments of high drama, was never far from the surface. Everton went on to beat Wednesday 3-2, and for Harris the day became the crowning glory of a 20-year career.

A son of the Wirral, born in Bebington on Merseyside, the former England youth international was recruited by Everton from non-league Port Sunlight in January 1954. The £10 fee was to prove one of the finest bargains in the club's history. Initially a winger, Harris had great positional versatility and occupied every outfield position in an Everton career which spanned more than a decade.

While he spent much of his career as a left-sided wing-half, the era's tactical shifts saw that position evolve so that he became a forerunner of the modern midfield destroyer. Even in a defensive role, the vision honed as schoolboy winger was still occasionally in evidence and a searching through ball would often pick out the run of Alex Young or Roy Vernon, Everton's pacey forwards.

Harris made his Everton debut in August 1955, in the middle of a difficult period for the club. The great Dixie Dean and Tommy Lawton-inspired teams of the 1930s were a fading memory and the investment of Littlewoods Pools magnate, John Moores, which would transform the club's fortunes in the 1960s, was still to come.

In a team of journeymen, Harris at first struggled to make an impression, but following the appointment of Johnny Carey as manager in October 1958, he flourished. As a player with Matt Busby's Manchester United, Carey had changed position from inside-forward to wing-half and, perhaps seeing something of himself in the young Harris, moved him from the Everton flank to a more withdrawn role at wing-half.

In his new position, occasionally deputising at full-back, Harris excelled, and even when the Moores money began to buy up some of British football's best players, the £10 signing kept his place among the "Mersey Millionaires" - as Everton eventually were known. Indeed, the underrated Harris was central to Everton's transformation from 1950s strugglers to one of the most accomplished English teams of the following decade.

In December 1962, midway through a League Championship-winning season, Harry Catterick, who had replaced Carey a year earlier, signed Sheffield Wednesday's wing-half Tony Kay, in a record transfer deal. Harris, who had performed impressively in the opening half of the season, was harshly dropped.

He bade his time in the reserves and his perseverance paid off in April 1964, when Kay was found to have been part of a match-fixing scam and subsequently jailed and banned for life. Harris returned in his place and went on to provide the best form of his career, culminating in the FA Cup win, where his was a calm head in an afternoon of high drama.

Catterick was a ruthless manager, however, and moved quickly to break up the Cup-winning team. Harris was sold to Cardiff City the following October for £15,000, and over five years at Ninian Park, his experience contributed hugely to one of Cardiff's most successful periods. In the 1967-68 season, Harris appeared in all of the Welsh club's European Cup Winners Cup games as they reached the semi-final, losing narrowly over two legs to Hamburg. In 1971 he dropped down a couple of divisions, playing out his career with Newport County, whom he briefly managed. He returned to Cardiff as assistant manager in the late 1970s, then coached briefly at Bobby Robson's Ipswich Town.

After dropping out of professional football, he returned to Wales, settling in Chepstow, where he managed the town's non-League club and ran a canvassing business with his sons.

He was a gregarious, fun-loving character, always popular with teammates and fans, and in his later years, Harris was a popular guest at Everton reunion dinners. His heart lay with his first club and it seemed appropriate that his funeral service was held at St Luke's Church, at the corner of Goodison Park.